Inadequate school meals

(Baonghean.vn) - The price of food and groceries has increased sharply while the income has remained unchanged, causing the quality of meals for boarding students to decrease.

The results of a survey by the education and health sector on the meals of boarding students in Nghe An province show that food hygiene and safety and nutrition assurance still have many shortcomings.

Currently, Nghe An province has 513 kindergartens with 741 boarding kitchens. However, only 391 of these kitchens have been granted food safety certificates. At the primary level, there are 63 schools with boarding kitchens, of which 40% do not meet food safety and hygiene standards.

The above figures show that the issue of food hygiene and safety in kindergarten and primary school canteens in Nghe An has not received adequate attention. Primary schools only focus on the quality of teaching and learning, while the children's meals are still prepared by the school based on the qualitative and parental contributions. With the cost of a meal ranging from 12,000 - 15,000 VND depending on the school and residential area for a meal, while food prices are increasingly expensive, to ensure the maintenance of meals, of course the only way is to reduce the children's food portions. However, according to a teacher in charge of boarding, the actual fee must cover all kinds of costs, so the children's meals are often unstable according to the market.

Public board of diet for boarding students of Vinh Tan Primary School

A parent whose child studies at Le Mao Primary School – Vinh City said: Many times when I had to pick my children up at noon, right when they were eating, I saw that their food portions were very simple, sometimes only two or three pieces of meat, a little plain pumpkin soup, a little rice and a banana; sometimes a small piece of fish, a little vegetable soup with meat (very little vegetables and meat, the soup was bland) and a little rice… I felt extremely sorry.

The quality of school meals has not improved but has gradually decreased in both quality and quantity, the risk of food safety and hygiene is also obvious, because no one can control the food source. Through surveys at a number of schools by health agencies, the state of nutritional disorders in students is at an alarming level, accompanied by consequences that affect the comprehensive development of children. Some diseases are on the rise such as: rickets, malnutrition, myopia or eye diseases, one of the main causes of which is an inadequate diet.

In the 2013-2014 school year, Vinh Tan Primary School had 612 students, including more than 400 boarding students. Due to the large area, some hamlets are far from the school, so the need for boarding meals of the students is always high. In particular, the school has more than 10 students from the fishing hamlet, so the boarding meals at school are extremely important for them. The school is one of the units that the City Department of Education highly appreciates for food hygiene and safety. However, the meals of boarding students at the school are still unclear.

According to regulations, the amount of food as well as the students' diet must be publicly displayed on the board every day. However, during our working session at the end of September, the student diet public board still clearly stated the menu of February 5, 2013 (meaning the menu of the previous school year) including: pork, cucumber soup + carrots, stir-fried kohlrabi and 3kg of pork ribs (for teachers on duty at noon). Meanwhile, observing the school kitchen, the kitchen staff were dividing the food into small pots for the classes including: tofu, braised pork and spinach soup. The school kitchen is small and cramped, the kitchen staff had to place the pots on the tile floor to divide the food, the risk of losing food safety and hygiene is inevitable.

Dividing food rations for classes at Vinh Tan Primary School

Another worrying fact is that the school health care team is lacking. According to Joint Circular No. 71/2007/TTLT-BGDĐT-BNV dated November 28, 2007 of the Ministry of Education and Training and the Ministry of Home Affairs, school cooks are not on the state payroll but are contracted by the school itself to outsource. Wages paid to chefs, janitors, and lunch staff for primary school children are collected according to Regulation No. 70/2009/QD-UB of the People's Committee of Nghe An province at a rate of 34,000 VND/student/month divided into an average of 22 sessions/month, so each afternoon for looking after and feeding children, the caregivers receive a salary of 1,500 VND/student. With such low wages, it is now very difficult for schools to recruit staff for boarding activities, because the work is hard and the wages are low, making it difficult to retain workers and attract new workers.

Ms. Ho Thi An - Deputy Head of the Preschool Education Department, Department of Education and Training said: With the regulation that the cook and lunch service staff are not part of the state staff but the school must hire outside, it has created a loophole in the management of the quality of meals for boarding students. With the mentality of being only contract employees with low wages, some kitchen staff have not fulfilled their responsibilities, processed food carelessly, and not ensured food hygiene and safety.

Not only are they concerned about the quality and nutrition of the school meals, many parents are also confused about the food sources provided for the school kitchens. Given the current widespread use of growth stimulants and food preservatives, some schools have chosen to purchase safe food by signing contracts with manufacturers with product quality certification.

However, in schools in rural and mountainous areas, due to difficult conditions, food sources and meal quality have not been given much attention by schools, kitchen staff have not been trained, and kitchens and cooking utensils have not been invested in, so most of the boarding kitchens in rural and mountainous schools have not met food hygiene and safety standards, and the rate of malnourished children, digestive disorders, and rickets in these areas is high.

Lunch is considered extremely important to provide energy for students to continue the second day of school. Therefore, in order for children to develop comprehensively both physically and mentally, schools need to pay more attention to food quality as well as nutrition and food hygiene and safety for each meal.

Vo Huyen